Paying Her Dues Returning The Favour
by mkcrl120
Summary: Set during the episode Selfless, what were Willow's thoughtsduring one specific conversation. Part of my 'Missing Scenes' series.


Fic: Paying Her Dues / Returning The Favour. 

Author: mkcrl120

Disclaimer: All the characters mentioned in this story belong to Joss Whedon or Mutant Enemy or some other people. I own nothing and wrote this just to get it out of my system.

Summary: Set during the episode Selfless, what were Willow's thoughts during one specific conversation.

Authors Notes: Part of my 'Missing Scenes' series. Which currently consists of the fics: 'It's Buffy', 'Thoughts Before Battle', 'Verbal Contract' and 'Eating Alone'. You don't need to read any of the others in order to understand this fic, you just need to be familiar with canon. If you do wish to read them, all my stories are here: http/ to nemogravis who beta-d this for me, as you can tell I took some of your suggestions, found that a compromise worked best on some parts and left others completely alone where I preferred the original... and ignored all your pesky American spelling ;-) Cheers for all the help.

Rating: 15 by English standards.

* * *

_Summers Residence _

_Sunnydale_

Willow sighed to herself. This was something she had brought up, this was something she had had to bring up. _'I was expecting problems from him, but to be honest I thought she'd be a little bit more understanding. It's not like she hasn't gone through similar things hersel-'_

Her thoughts were rudely interrupted by the continuation of the argument.

"She's not the Anya you knew, Xander. She's a **demon**." Buffy said, seemingly trying to put as much emphasis on that final word as she could.

_'Looks like the uncomfortable silence is over then.' _She thought as she twisted her head to the side to witness the other participant in this **discussion**.

"That's doesn't mean you have to kill her." Came the deeper reply.

_'And that's the Xander's forced I-am-being-calm voice.'_ Willow mused as she twisted back to view the inevitable response.

"Don't act like this is easy for me. You know it's not."

"There are other options." Xander countered.

She tuned further conversation out as she withdrew into her own thoughts. _'There are times when I've really felt like we've grown up, but here we are again. Back in high school.'_ She paused as she took stock of what she'd just realised. _'With just a little role reversal.'_ She quickly amended.

She felt Buffy turn towards her, the first time that either of them had spared a glance her way since the topic had become so heated.

"-are mystical deaths, right? There has to be something."

She thought the question through, quickly realising that the newfound silence meant that they were both waiting for her response as a backup to their own point of view. Not wanting to favour either side she answered as diplomatically as she could. "I don't have anywhere near that kind of power. I didn't have that kind of power when—" She caught herself, pushing the grief back, silently promising herself that it would get better. Changing the focus slightly she moved on before either had time to comment on what she hadn't said. "And I-I don't think I trust the power I do have."

She watched as Buffy immediately focused on that last piece of information, "It's okay," was the only response directed at her, before Buffy quickly turned back to Xander and used it in her favour.

The verbal tennis match continued and Willow realised she felt like more of a spectator than she had in years.

"-friends go all crazy and start killing people, we **help **them." She heard her oldest friend in the world say.

Looking up she quickly confirmed that he was gesturing her way.

"Sitting right here." was all she trusted herself to respond.

"I'm sorry." She felt relieved at his apology, but was unsure what to make of the comment tagged on the end. "But it's true."

_'Think spectator status is probably going to be safest.' _She decided as her mind flooded with all the previous times she'd seen these two go toe-to-toe. Something she'd realised had occured with far less frequency over the previous year or so.

_'What happened..?'_ She thought, trying to remember the exact time she'd last witnessed something like this. _'He hasn't brought **anything **up in years... and now he's back. Did he simply stop caring..? Is the threat to Anya simply the first time in a while that it's been important enough to him to actually fight for his opinion..?'_

The next thought that occured to her made her wonder if he'd leapt to her defense just as easily. _'Did he do this for me just before the Summer..?'_

Then the full implications of that statement sank in.

_'Did he **have **to do this for me..? Plead my case and stop Buffy getting her slay on..?'_

Her mind leapt back to the argument as she realised her name had just been mentioned.

"-low was different. She's a human. Anya's a demon."

_'Thank the goddess.'_ She sighed in relief.

Her attention was once again brought into the argument as Xander stood up, his entire body-language now far more confrontational.

"No, of course not. You know, if there's a mass-murdering demon that you're, oh, say, **boning**, then it's all grey area."

_'High school. I knew it.' _She claimed her silent victory before her mind registered Buffy's response. _'Wait, what was that... Spike? You think Xander's issues are with **Spike**..?'_

Thinking about it harder she came to an obvious conclusion. _'Well of course he's going to have some issues with Spike... I mean who wouldn't. But I thnk the person he's actually talking about is..'_

"-Angel! Do you even **remember **that?" Buffy challenged, Willow was surprised to note they were both standing now. "-put a sword through his heart because I had to."

"And all that worked out okay." She heard herself saying in an attempt to lighten the tone in the room.

"Do you remember giving me Willow's message: Kick. His. Ass."

Each word seemed capitalised, even though she'd sworn Buffy hadn't even paused when uttering them. "I never said that-" She automatically responded even as her eyes fell on Xander as the implications hit her.

_'He lied.'_

She repeated the phrase many times in quick succession, so many that it felt like her silent mantra.

_'He lied. He lied. He **lied**.'_ She continued to chant to herself, her eyes never leaving Xander as he continued his argument with her other best friend.

_'My two best friends.' _She thought to herself; reminding herself of all the times she'd seen them argue over the years and yet somehow this, **this** had never come up. This was a secret Xander had lived with since before they finished high school. This was something none of the group had even suspected up until this point.

_'From the way Buffy just kept on rolling, I don't even think she processed exactly what I said.'_ She thought to herself. _'Considering how little input I've had in the conversation, I don't think either of them have listened to me except when I've been directly asked a question.'_

Still completely torn, she tried to come up with altruistic reasons for why Xander may have done what he did.

_'It was six billion people or one vamp he didn't like.'_

_'If Buffy had hesitated then Angelus might have killed her, and he'd never put Angel's life over Buffy's never mind Angelus's.'_

_'It was revenge on the creature that had killed Ms Calendar.'_

But every single one was tainted by the knowledge that, back then, Xander had fallen completely for Buffy and despite whatever else might have been playing on his mind-

She shrugged the unwanted thoughts off, refusing to take them to any natural conclusion.

_'**Possible **conclusion.' _she quickly corrected herself.

Instead Willow forced herself to focus on the other half of this argument. The small blonde who was currently giving as good as she got.

Her mind leapt back to the death of Jenny, and how Buffy seemed far angrier at the deaths of some guys that she didn't know than she was at that of someone who'd fought beside them.

Then she remembered that Buffy had been angry with the computer teacher way before it'd reached that point. Angry due to the Angelus situation.

She reconsidered her earlier thoughts, about how this whole scenario was in fact a complete role-reversal of their time in high school.

_'Yeah, so Xander was probably jealous... but he was also young, and to be honest, at the time didn't really distinguish between good and evil demons... demons were demons to him back then.' _As she completed the thought she stumbled across another realisation she hadn't really wanted to unearth._ 'So what the hell's Buffy problem now..?'_

_'What's **her **excuse..?'_

_'She's lived through this before... and she was in the exact same boat that Xander is now. She should understand more than anyone.'_

She analysed Xander's crude comment about demons that Buffy was boni-... being intimate with.

'_That **can't** be true. She can't be **that **shallow...'_

Her thoughts got torn back to the conversation as it abruptly ended with Buffy making a request for someone to find her another way to deal with the situation.

Then before she knew it, Xander was out the door and Buffy was armed.

Her eyes met Buffy's. As the silent question loomed between them, she forced herself to stand her ground, making no move to follow and none to apologise for not acting as her friend would have expected.

"I can't. I'm sorry." Willow stated as she watched Buffy's reaction to her implicated answer, still just watching as the other woman turned and walked out the door.

As she remained alone in the now empty house, she tried not to think negative thoughts about either of her friends. She almost laughed as she realised she was judging them for their short-comings... judging them, when she herself had taken her own selfish actions to the point where she was willing to destroy the world.

Lowering her head she thought back to when she'd started out on a dark path in order to help one of her best friends with their troubled love life.

_'Troubled..?'_ She tried not to laugh out-loud. _'Her ex was trying to end all existence as we know it.'_

A dark path that had resulted in her other best friend needing to stand on the brink and stop her from ending all life as they knew it.

And with that came the realisation that she had to help Anya. Not just for Xander's sake, though that in itself would have been enough. But because she had to give others the chance that her friends given her.

For Xander's sake she would keep his secret, keep it until both he and Buffy weren't too close to the problem. Wait until they both had enough distance to realise the similarities in their situations, instead of focusing on the differences. Idly she wondered if that day would ever come.

Forcing herself to concentrate on the task at hand, she remembered an earlier comment of Buffy's.

_'We can't bring them back... nor did we bring Warren back...' _she thought, clamping down on the anger the thought of him caused even now. _'And we didn't bring Jenny back either, nor any of the others Angelus may have gotten his hands on... but we did stop him, me, whatever from causing any more pain... and **we **did get a second chance.'_ She concluded, as she realised for the very first time she'd come to accept the fact that she had been a killer, and maybe deserved to be grouped as such.

_'Stopping Anya dead isn't the only solution,' _she thought back to Xander throwing the suggestion out earlier. _'Stopping Anya from killing is the main objective here, and that's what we ought to concentrate on.'_

_'And the **only **problem with Anya, beyond her general Anya-ness...'_ she paused as the solution hit her.

She practically ran upstairs, as her mind desperately attempted to remember the location of D'Hoffryn's amulet.

* * *

_**The End**_


End file.
